Blessed Is He
by Wilusa
Summary: Ben returns to Damascus, where he receives a stunning surprise.
1. Chapter 1

DISCLAIMER: Carnivale and its canon characters are the property of HBO and the show's producers; no copyright infringement is intended.

_**Note:**_ This story can be viewed as taking place in the same reality as "Dead of Night" and its followups, or not. It's written so as to work either way.

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"Sure you wanna get out here?" the produce truck driver asked dubiously. "The place, uh, looks sort o' grand."

Ben Hawkins mentally translated _grand_ as _expensive_. He almost smiled. But not quite. "No, I been here before. That 'Hotel Astoria' sign don't mean nothin'. It ain't fancy inside. If it ain't an out-an'-out whorehouse by now, it's headin' that way."

_'Course_, he reflected,_ I can't afford a room even in a dump like this. But if I spend the night in Damascus, I'll hole up in a doorway somewhere. Won't be the first time._

The driver, a lanky farmhand, took a closer look. "Huh. Even the sign's seen better days, now I think about it." Pulling up to the curb, he said kindly, "Careful gettin' out, now!"

Ben winced. _It's obvious I seen better days, too._ Aloud, he said, "Yeah. Thanks for the ride, mister."

"No problem. I been broke often enough myself."

Ben dropped his duffel bag out of the truck, then eased himself out after it. He couldn't hide his disability - couldn't stand quite straight, or hold his left arm in a natural position. But he was doing better than he had a few months ago, and he managed to get out without making any movements that would trigger pain.

Physical pain. The emotional pain associated with Damascus was like a noose tightening around his heart.

He'd actually enjoyed this past week. Being on his own, for however short a time.

The only way he could support himself now was as a carny freak, exhibiting his blue blood. He no longer had the strength required for manual labor - couldn't have risked performing it anyway, lest he strain himself and reopen wounds that had never completely healed. And with his poor education, he didn't consider himself qualified for any other type of work. The "knowledge" that had come with Belyakov's boon seemingly dealt only with Avataric matters, and was spotty even in that respect. It hadn't transformed him into a learned, sophisticated man.

So he'd swallowed his pride and settled for exhibiting himself as a freak, letting the rubes look on as he deliberately opened an edge of the wound in his belly and shed some blood. It was a wretched existence. But he'd finally saved up enough tip money that he could take two weeks off from Burrell's Carnival, and from the well-meaning but stifling attentions of Ruthie and Gabe. He was grateful that they'd accompanied him to Burrell's, Ruthie doubling as nurse and undemanding lover. But their constant fretting about his health only made _him_ more anxious about it. Now he'd proved he could manage on his own. He'd been so successful at hitching rides that he'd even been able to buy simple meals, hadn't been reduced to begging.

But the euphoria, the hair-blowing-in-the-wind sense of freedom, had worn off as he neared his destination.

_Why am I proud o' myself? Hell, these drivers have only been pickin' me up 'cause they feel sorry for the crip._

He'd pretty much accepted that Justin Crowe had a Dark Avatar son who'd brought him back to life. That could be reconciled with the prophecies that the Usher would be the last Avatar: in the most probable course of events, he could be destined ultimately to outlive both Ben and his own son. Ben's best chance of breaking that chain of destiny might have been to identify and kill the son first. But aside from the unfairness of his never having been given any hint that a complication like that would arise, how on God's green earth could the man he'd defeated and killed be in better physical shape than he was? Where was the justice in that?

He couldn't shake the suspicion that at least some of his misfortunes were punishment for his sins.

It was one of those sins that had brought him back to Damascus. He hadn't come to atone for it. If he'd done what he feared he had, no atonement was possible. But he needed to _know_. To understand what guilt he bore.

As he gazed up at the facade of the Hotel Astoria - haunted by memories, held back by fears - he never heard the farm truck pull away.

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Images crowded into his mind. The office behind the registration desk, where he'd first glimpsed a "clerk" with long gray hair. The hotel desk clerk trying to bar his way, as he raced back after he'd realized who that gray-haired man was. The desk clerk staggering when he slugged him. His father's disfigured face.

He recalled the revulsion he'd felt on seeing that. Revulsion, and disgust, with a coward who'd do such a thing to himself to elude a pursuer. _**To **__**keep Crowe from becomin' Prophet**_, he reflected, with a remorseful shake of his head. He understood that now. _For my sake, not for his._

He saw himself healing a man who didn't want to be healed, yet submitted meekly to the son he loved. While Varlyn Stroud sought to bash the door in with an ax, ignoring the desk clerk's protests that he had a key...

_I told myself I had to fix Scudder's face so Belyakov would be sure it was him. But was that the real reason?_

_I knew I'd be takin' most o' the life-force from the guy nearest the door. Was I tryin' to kill Stroud, healin' my pa for no damn reason but that?_

_Whether I was or wasn't, I shoulda known better than to do it with someone else as close as that desk clerk was._

_I __**did**__ know better. _

_That's the sin._

Stroud had evidently realized what was happening and backed off quickly, thrusting the confused desk clerk toward the door. Ben remembered hearing someone fall - not sink to his knees and crumple gently, but topple like a felled tree. When he and Scudder dashed out a few minutes later, Stroud was gone; a number of people who'd been farther away were dazedly getting to their feet. But the desk clerk lay flat on his face, motionless.

Ben hadn't dared pause in his flight. But since then - barring the unwelcome "respite" of a weeks-long coma - not a night had passed in which that last image hadn't wound a sinuous path through his dreams.

Now that he'd reached the hotel, he had no idea how to proceed. If the same desk clerk wasn't on duty - a possibility he scarcely dared let himself hope for - how could he find out whether the man was alive or dead? Would the present staff even know? And how could he explain his need to know? If he learned the man was dead, should he seek out his family? What if they'd been left destitute? He wouldn't be able to help them. Did he owe them an expression of grief, or would he merely be punishing himself, focusing on his need rather than theirs?

_Well, standin' here all day ain't gonna accomplish nothin'._

Dragging his duffel bag (he wasn't able to sling it over his shoulder, light though it was), he made his way to the door and entered the lobby.

Then his knees buckled, and he thought he was about to faint.

The plain, round-faced, balding man behind the desk _was_ the same one who'd been there before.


	2. Chapter 2

The desk clerk had recognized Ben as well, even through a week-old beard. He took a step backward; the look on his face, not surprisingly, was one of abject terror.

"Wait!" Ben crossed the lobby more quickly than he would have thought possible. "I ain't one o' the bad guys. Really! I'm sorry 'bout what happened. I only came back to see if you're OK."

The older man - fiftyish, Ben took him to be - paused, considering that. He must have decided Ben had an honest look. His voice shook only slightly when he said, "I'm all right. Had a mild heart attack, but I'm fine now. You don't look so OK yourself, though."

They were alone in the seedy lobby, so Ben didn't hesitate to reply. "Got in a fight with a bigger guy."

That got the man's attention. "The one who was here? I figured out that he wasn't a cop, and he was the one who wanted to hurt Scudder."

"Not a fight with him. With the even tougher guy he works for." _Works or worked. I wonder if anyone's knocked Stroud off yet?_

"Shit. What's become of Scudder?"

The less said on that subject, Ben decided, the better. "I don't know where he is now."

The desk clerk nodded. "I won't pry. Scudder had secrets he didn't want anyone to know, and I respect that. But can you tell me how _you_ fit in? I've heard that you and Scudder left together. That it looked like he was going with you of his own free will. And" - here the man was shaking his head in disbelief - "that his face had been restored. Can that possibly be true?"

"Uh, yeah," Ben said uncomfortably. "But the explanation's part o' the stuff he wouldn't want you to know."

"And you? Who are you? What was your interest in Scudder?"

"Tell me yours first."

The man smiled for the first time, in admiration of Ben's caution. "I just knew him as a quiet, harmless soul who wouldn't hurt a fly, but had enemies out to kill him. I had no idea why. When he thought he was in such a desperate spot that he needed to _burn his face off_, I couldn't help feeling sorry for him. That's all it was."

"Was he really doin' some kind o' work for you in that office, or just hidin' there an' posin'?"

"Working," the man said immediately. "I found work he could do, and let him live in there, secretly, after he got out of the room where he'd burned himself." He extended a hand in greeting. "Name's Samuel Hyland, by the way."

Shaking warmly, Ben said, "Mine's Harry Clayton." That was the alias he was using, to honor his father and the presumed-dead Clayton Jones, and it was just too damn bad if anyone recognized it as almost the same one he'd used in New Canaan.

"Harry," Samuel Hyland repeated thoughtfully, lingering on the syllables. "A nickname for Henry. That's some coincidence, isn't it?"

Ben was discovering he liked this man. With one of his rare grins, he admitted, "Ain't no coincidence at all, it's an alias."

"And you are -? Really?"

"Scudder's son." He figured Hyland had guessed it already. "Ben Hawkins."

"Hmm." Hyland thought that over for a few seconds, then said quietly, "Scudder told me his son might show up here someday, when he was dead and gone. He said I'd recognize him, because his son would, of course, _know his own name_. I'd like to believe you're his son, but that name isn't the one he told me."

Ben had a sudden, tingling sensation that this _mattered_. But he _had_ given Hyland his true name!

Might Hack have expected his son to introduce himself as Ben Scudder? That didn't seem likely. It wasn't his legal name, and his father was aware he never used it.

Then inspiration struck. "I know what you mean. My name is Ben Krohn Hawkins. That middle name is spelled K-R-O-H-N." Ben was sure it was Emma Scudder's maiden name. Hack must have been the one who wanted it included in his legal name, so it was understandable he would have viewed it as important.

But Hyland was shaking his head. "Sorry. I want to believe you're Scudder's son, but I can't do it unless you give me that son's full name."

_Full?_

And suddenly, he got it. "Shit." Now he was shaking his own head, making a face. "You mean the name I hate, the one I ain't used in so many years I damn near forgot about it. I'm _Benedict_ Krohn Hawkins!"

Hyland broke into a wide smile. "That's it! Hack said no one would be likely to guess it, because Benjamin is so much more common than Benedict."

"Yeah, an' it ain't no secret why. All the kids in school razzed me 'bout bein' named for the traitor Benedict Arnold. I shucked the name soon's I could, but the razzin' didn't let up for years."

That, he recalled, had been one of his many grievances against his absent father. His mother had told him his father had insisted their child be given that name, for no better reason than that it had "come to him in a dream before you were born." _I s'pose he might o' dreamed somethin' worse, but the only worse name I can think of is freakin' Judas._

Hyland leaned across the desk and gripped Ben's arm. The look on his face now suggested that the youth's full name was a magic phrase like _Open Sesame_. "Come in the back office with me, son. It'll only take me a minute to find someone to cover the desk. Your pa left things here - probably had to, when the two of you needed to get away fast. But I know he wanted you to have those things."

Ben hesitated, but decided there was no reason to think he'd be walking into danger. Hyland took him into the office, then showed his trust by leaving him alone there while he rounded up a substitute desk clerk.

Ben saw the marks of Stroud's ax still on the door, and shivered.

But unpleasant associations were forgotten when Hyland came back in, locked the door, and hauled a beat-up suitcase out of the closet. Ben sensed at once that it contained something more interesting than his father's soiled laundry.

"All yours," Hyland announced. "You can stay in here as long as you like to go through it - and, of course, take it with you when you leave. _If_ you decide to leave."

Ben looked up. "Huh? 'If'? What do you mean?"

"Ah, if you don't mind my saying so, Ben, you look as if you've been down on your luck lately. _And_ came out of that fight in bad shape, though I hope the bad guy came out worse." Hyland smiled, then continued kindly, "I haven't been able to hire anyone else to do the light clerical work Hack was doing, and it really was important. The job is just as much yours as the suitcase, if you want it. Plus the room for sleeping. It's not much, but it was good enough for your pa, and his enemies aren't likely to come back to the same place. The pay isn't much either, but I'm sure we could come to terms."

Ben was struck speechless. The only person who'd ever taken the initiative in offering him a job was Samson, and he'd been prompted by Belyakov, who had an ulterior motive.

At last he mumbled, "Thank you. But I don't think I could do no clerical work."

"I'm sure you could," Hyland told him. "It's not hard, and I'd teach you myself."

Ben's eyes felt suspiciously moist. _So my pa finally did run into one man who's good an' decent. His friends warn't all like Evander Geddes._

"Thank you," he said again, meaning it from the bottom of his heart. "I'll think about it." He already knew he couldn't desert Ruthie, or support her and Gabe on what he'd earn here. But what a blessing it would have been to have a safe, quiet job for a while, in a place where he was respected and didn't have to demean himself day in and day out!

"Yes, think it over." Something in Hyland's eyes told Ben he'd already read him well enough to know what the answer would be. "But first, take all the time you need to explore that suitcase!"


	3. Chapter 3

The suitcase turned out to hold a single, sturdy cardboard box, which filled almost the entire interior. Rather than wrestle it out of the case, at the probable cost of leaving a pool of blue blood on Hyland's floor, Ben decided to open it where it was.

The first sight that greeted him was a note - whose handwriting, he was ashamed to admit, he wouldn't have recognized. But he was soon left in no doubt as to the writer's identity.

_Ben _(Hack Scudder began)_,_

_If you've inherited these documents, I regret to inform you that you are now in possession of stolen property. I filched them from a Templar Lodge in Loving, New Mexico. But I hope you won't lose sleep over it. If the documents are of value to anyone, it's to us Avatars, not a bunch of pseudo-Templars who've forgotten their mission._

"Holy books," Ben remembered Frank Mooney saying. "Gospels." That meant more than one. More than the Gospel of Matthias that was the Avatars' Bible.

_I'll tell you at the outset what __isn't__ here. Don't look for the legendary "Sauniere Manuscript," which I'm rumored to own! I checked out the legends, and discovered they grew out of a hoax. A French priest named Sauniere made a fortune by shady means, mostly by charging exorbitant fees for services the Church should provide gratis. Then, being a devilish sort, he spread rumors that he'd found an ancient manuscript whose startling contents enabled him to blackmail the Vatican. It never happened. Spurious "Sauniere Manuscripts" show up from time to time, but they're claptrap anyone could cobble together, not based on inside knowledge of anything._

_Unfortunately, this box also doesn't contain the Gospel of Matthias. I had it, and a false friend stole it from me. That's the ancient writing believed to hold the most significance for Avatars. I mastered most of its secrets before I lost it. I realize that doesn't help you any. But the good news here is that while Matthias is the most important book, it's also the one that's survived in the most copies. You may already have read it._

Ben nodded; he had. Remembering Belyakov's extensive library, he began to wonder if there was _anything_ of value here that would be new to him.

_I've had these other books and papers for years now, and haven't made much headway in evaluating them. Matthias was in English translation, but the others are in languages I don't understand, at least not well. And it's possible that only a few lines buried in a document are important, with the rest being filler included to hide the significant passages and discourage seekers from hunting for them. It's also possible that __nothing__ here is important! _

_But on the plus side, I'm not giving you crumbling papyrus to puzzle over. The originals of these works are said to be ancient, but you're seeing 19th-century printed copies._

_Good luck, Ben. You'll be looking at them with young, fresh eyes. And I'm confident that if something is buried in here that you need to know, you'll find it._

_Your loving father,_

_Henry Scudder_

Ben didn't share Hack's confidence. He had only a tenth-grade education, and he'd barely scraped through that. He had no idea where to find foreign-language dictionaries (Hack hadn't left any lying around). There might not be dictionaries for ancient, dead tongues. What was he supposed to do - devote decades of his life to this translation project, only to find out either that there was nothing of value here, or that it duplicated material he'd already seen in Belyakov's English translations?

But then he thought of something. There'd been at least three words in Hack's note that were completely unfamiliar to him...he looked back to verify it, and found them quickly. _Exorbitant. Gratis. Spurious. _He couldn't define those words, couldn't use any of them in a sentence. But when he'd seen them in context, he'd understood exactly what his father meant.

_Could that be Belyakov's boon kickin' in, finally bein' o' some use?_

Given that scant encouragement, he began sifting through the hoard of documents. "Documents" was a good catchall term. There were two properly bound books, four whose bindings had just about fallen off, and a dozen clumps of paper held together with string, ribbons, and in one case, a shoelace. Despite their dating "only" from the previous century, all were stained, moldy, and smelly.

_God gimme strength._

But as he settled down on the floor to examine them in more detail, he felt a heightening excitement that he couldn't explain. Was some psychic sense telling him there really was a priceless needle in this haystack?

As he leafed through the collections, he found he could recognize Latin and Greek words here and there, though not any others. _So Belyakov had some knowledge o' Latin an' Greek._

And for a time he encountered marginal notes in what he now knew was Hack Scudder's handwriting. Almost without exception, they expressed discouragement. He wasn't surprised when they ceased to appear.

Hack had apparently spent a great deal of time - most of it fruitlessly - on each document before he proceeded to the next. It seemed he'd never gotten to the bottom of the box. Ben, on the other hand, was determined to start by giving everything a quick once-over, regardless of how hard it might be to repack them.

And so it happened that he lifted out the bottommost stack of ribbon-bound paper, and discovered that at least parts of it featured parallel columns of Latin with the English translation. There was also an insert - written in a crabbed hand by one Charles Collins, and dated by him 1850 - that provided the first genuine commentary Ben had seen.

Collins wrote:

_Among all the cliches and doubletalk, there appear to be three passages here that relate to the Avataric struggle. I don't fully understand __how__ they relate, but I believe they do._

_The first Passage._

**These are the secret sayings which the living Jesus spoke and which Didymos Judas Thomas wrote down. **

_I think we can assume Jesus has nothing to do with this. It's Didymos Judas Thomas with whom we should be concerned._

_I'll say in passing that other Templars have claimed the spelling "Didymos" proves this Gospel was written in Greek, like most of its era. But I tend to believe Latin was the original language, "Didymus" changed to "Didymos" by a later copyist._

_Many Apocrypha refer to Judas Thomas. This is not a reference to the betrayer, but to another Apostle by the same name, usually called Jude to differentiate._

Ben shook his head, reflecting, _Jeez. Only a little while ago I was rememberin' how I resented havin' the same name as a traitor, an' the only worse name I could think of was Judas! How creepy is that?_

_The Hebrew name Judas actually means "praised" _(the Commentary went on),_ a good meaning_._ More significantly, Thomas is from the Aramaic, and means "twin." There are legends that hold that the supposed two Apostles named Jude and Thomas were one and the same man, and that he was Jesus' lookalike twin brother._

Ben blinked in bewilderment. _Sayin' __**that**__, an' he claims Jesus ain't important here?_

_That almost certainly is not historical fact_ (the dry Commentary continued). _This passage is relevant because it's been held from time immemorial that Avatars are symbolically mirror-image twins, and because the passage refers - apparently for the first time ever - not just to Judas Thomas but to __Didymos__ Judas Thomas. Didymos is the Greek word for "twin." So we're seeing Twin Judas Twin. Why must it be explained twice, and by means of such an awkward word order, that Judas is (supposedly) someone's twin?_

_I sense a connection with Avataric lore, but the nature of the connection eludes me._

Ben sat back and thought. The only theory he'd heard concerning the origin of Avatars was Belyakov's. Supposedly, angels loyal to God and Satan had been battling in the heavens, wounding one another, and their blood had rained down on the earth. God had then fashioned the first, full-grown Avatar from the earth's clay soil, and blood come down from the heavens. He'd wanted this Light Avatar merely to instruct and help humans. But Satan, seeing what He'd done, used the same method to fashion the first Dark Avatar, a mirror image of the Creature of Light. And ever since, Avatars' agendas had consisted mostly of warring against each other. Because God and Satan had been unable to separate the two kinds of blood used in the creation of the first pair, any Avatar was capable of fathering either Light or Dark offspring.

As the Tattooed Man was destined to be the Omega - it had been thought, either the latter-born or the survivor of his pair - it was sometimes said that the first-created of the original pair could be called the Alpha. A beginning in Light and end in Darkness. Symmetrical. Dispiriting, perhaps. But was not every day fated to begin in light and end in darkness?

Now Ben was thinking, _That warn't never "revealed." Just a theory. Why couldn't it be that the first pair had a father an' mother - got born, just like all us later Avatars, an' came out o' the womb bein' mirror-image twins?_

_Maybe what this Gospel thing is meant to show is two male twins standin' to one side or t'other o' their father! All male names, all in a row...if the pa was put higher, it'd suggest he was God. But he ain't on a higher level than his sons, or a lower one either. Meanin' he's some kind o' Avatar, just like them!_

Amazed at his temerity in having come up with such an idea, he plunged back into the document and Collins' commentary. _My notion'll prob'ly get shot down before I finish another paragraph._

_The second Passage._

**The disciples said to Jesus, "Tell us how our end will be." Jesus said, "Have you discovered, then, the beginning, that you look for the end? For where the beginning is, there will the end be. Blessed is he who will take his place in the beginning; he will know the end and will not experience death." **

Ben stared at the passage, read it over and over. _Is it sayin' the end - whatever the Usher, or the Omega if we want to call him that, is gonna bring about - won't be the final end? That it'll be followed by a new beginnin'?_

For some reason, the lines gave him goosebumps. Why? He certainly didn't _want_ an end! An end to Avatars, maybe, but the prophecies he'd heard seemed to be referring to more than that. To the end of humanity, or at least of civilization. _It's Belyakov's bomb vision that should be givin' me the shivers, not talk of a new beginnin'._

He'd realized that he now had enough knowledge of Latin to judge the accuracy of some translations. So before even looking at Collins' commentary, he let his eyes drift back and forth between the columns of Latin and English.

And a Latin word leapt out at him, so suddenly that it made him yelp.

_"Benedictus?"_

But of course, that was the equivalent of the English word "blessed"...

He looked back at the English line: **Blessed is he who will take his place in the beginning; he will know the end and will not experience death.**

As Commentary on it, Collins had written:

_Blessed is he who will take his place in the beginning?_

_"Blessed" is he who will take his place in the beginning?_

_Benedict__ is he who will take his place in the beginning!_

Ben dropped the page as if it had burned him. His instinctive reaction was to cry out mentally _No, no!_ He'd done enough, had enough done to him_,_ already. He didn't want another special role, no matter what it might entail!

_Charles Collins was a nutcase_, he told himself. _This crap ain't got nothin' to do with Avatars._

But then, why had _he_ detected something so relevant in Collins' "first Passage"?

_I went into it expectin' to find somethin', that's all. An' to do it, I had to stand what I know 'bout Avatars on its head. So that don't prove nothin'._

But his name was Benedict...

_"Blessed" in that Passage prob'ly just means blessed, if any of it means anythin' at all. Collins was goin' out on a limb by guessin' it might refer to a man who was actually __**named**__ "Blessed."_

_There ain't nothin' special 'bout me. I wouldn't even exist if Belyakov - a __**Light**__ Avatar - had succeeded in killin' my pa back in the War. I'm only alive 'cause he let a stupid bear get in his way._

But the coincidence of the names Judas and Benedict nagged at him. As he himself had imagined it, the first Passage had depicted the first Light-Dark pair of Avatars flanking another male Avatar who was their father. A man whose name was an embarrassment, because it was the same one borne by a traitor.

If he, Ben Hawkins, was truly meant to "take his place in" a future "beginning," the implication was that he too would father a Light-Dark pair of Avatars. And he, their father, would bear a name identified with that of a traitor.

_Maybe the pa o' the first Light-Dark pair warn't really named Judas. Could that name o' been picked to use here, like a symbol, to __**make me see**__ a parallel with me?_

_But why imagine I'm so important? If this stuff does deal with Avatars, it could be a different Benedict._

Except for the fact that _he_ was the Light Avatar destined from birth to combat the Usher of Destruction. And even before his birth, his father had somehow been told what to name him.

"No, no!" He was tearing his hair now, screaming aloud."This is a damn coincidence, nothin' to do with our kind at all! How could I - how could any man - raise two kids like that, knowin' one was Light an' the other Dark? It's never happened, never will happen!"

_A damn coincidence, nothin' to do with our kind at all... _But what about the eerie prophecy that this "blessed" one would never experience death? Ben had thought it strange that he hadn't died when his Texas cousins buried him alive. He still suspected Evander Geddes really had covered his face with plaster of paris, leaving him no airway; he hadn't suffocated then, either. And he'd tried to tell himself that he hadn't bled to death in the cornfield because his abdominal wound had been pressed against Justin's body; but knowing he actually had lost a great deal of blood, he found it hard to believe.

All Avatars were hardier than other men, could endure more before it would kill them. Was he different from other Avatars? At this point, he wasn't sure. But it would be a cruel irony if Justin could be killed in only one narrowly defined way, otherwise never injured at all...whereas _he_ could be gravely wounded, maimed, yet never know the release of death.

He dropped to his knees and raised his eyes to the window. Tears streamed down his cheeks as he said softly, "I done my share for this cause. Followed the rules, killed the Usher. It ain't my fault he had a son to bring him back - how could I o' stopped it, even if I'd known? I done my share, wrecked my health in the process. Ain't that enough?"

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And then, suddenly, he found himself back in..._St. Dymphna's Chapel_, he realized.

As before, a cleric knelt with his back to him, praying in Latin before a statue of the Madonna holding the Christ Child. The Madonna had no eyes, and as the cleric droned on, in Justin Crowe's voice, a bruised and battered Christ Child reached out plaintively toward Ben.

Ben understood the vision better than he had before. He realized his grandmother Emma Scudder was blind, and knew what a warped childhood his father had experienced with her and his decadent cousins. He could appreciate that this was in part a plea for him to "rescue" Hack, and in a sense, the whole benighted clan.

But on a deeper level, he perceived now that the Christ Child - representing the Christian faith - was appealing to him to save that faith from wicked "men of God" who sought to pervert its teachings, and "blind" Church administrators who failed to see what was happening.

_But it ain't my fight! I've done all I can, given all I have in me..._

No one answered. But as he stood silently weeping, he began, for the first time, truly to listen to "Justin's" rendering of the Latin prayer. Thanks to his boon, he now knew what the man was saying.

_Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum._

_Benedictu in mulieribus, et benedicta fructus ventris tui Jesu._

_Sancta Maria, Mater Dei, ora pro nobis peccatoribus,_

_Nunc et in mortis nostrae. Amen._

Repeated, over and over.

_But he's sayin' it wrong_, Ben realized. _Three different places, an' he keeps makin' the same mistakes._

The mistakes didn't turn the prayer into a joke or an obscenity; they were just annoying. Sure to catch and hold the attention of anyone with a rudimentary knowledge of Latin.

_"Benedictu" don't mean nothin'. He's supposed to be sayin' "Benedicta tu" - two words, meanin' "blessed art thou," addressed to a woman._

_"Benedicta fructus ventris" - here he should be sayin' "benedictus."_ _ It means "blessed is the fruit o' thy womb," but the gender o' "benedictus" an' "fructus" gotta agree. _

_An' it should be "Nunc et in hora mortis nostrae" - "Now an' at the hour of our death." Leavin' out "hora" makes it "Now an' at of our death." Sloppy in any language._

Was that the whole point, to show the cleric's evil intent through his inability to say the prayer correctly?

Or was distracting jargon being used to conceal a nugget of truth?

_Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum._

_Benedictu in mulieribus..._

On and on.

Until, in what could have been his tenth repetition of the prayer, the cleric spun around. And his face was not Justin's, but was austere and ancient and aglow with an inner light. His eyes caught and held Ben's.

_Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum!_

_**Benedict, tu...**_

And Ben, snapping out of the vision with a terrified gasp, heard what he'd been meant to hear all along.

_**"Benedict...thou!"**_

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When he was able to stop shaking, he wiped his tears away and thought resignedly, _All right. I may feel washed up, but God's still got a plan for me. I got a __**callin'.**_

_It seems to involve more than just killin' Justin. So I reckon I am the one who "takes his place" in this new beginnin'. An' if it means I'll father Light an' Dark twins ...I'll worry 'bout that when I come to it._

He was exhausted. But he decided to read a little more of the ancient text, and Collins' commentary. That shouldn't take long, since Collins had found only three passages relevant.

_The third Passage._

**Jesus said, "Blessed is he who came into being before he came into being. ... ** **[T]here are five trees for you in Paradise which remain undisturbed summer and winter and whose leaves do not fall. Whoever becomes acquainted with them will not experience death." **

With the predictable Commentary:

_Benedict__ is he who came into being before he came into being!_

_Who knows_, Ben thought wearily, _maybe I did. If an ancient text referred to me, an' my pa was told what to name me before I was born, maybe I existed the same way the Tattooed Man did. A concept? Or more than that?_

He was intrigued by the idea of the five trees, "whose leaves do not fall." _Justin has one big tree tattooed on his chest. I never seen his back, but most o' the pictures an' visions I've seen o' the Tattooed Man's back show four more trees there. 'Course, they're all leafless an' dead..._

By now he was almost too tired to think straight. But as he collapsed on the cot that must have been his father's, his last waking thought was, _Could it be that Justin's the Usher o' Destruction, an' I'm the Usher o'...New Creation?_

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"Ben? Are you OK in there, son?"

Ben woke with a start. "Wh-what?"

He needed a few seconds to remember where he was, then a few more to realize that the angle of the light streaming in through the window meant it was midmorning. He sat up - with the usual grimaces of pain - and called out, "I'm fine, thank'ee, Mr. Hyland. Just overslept."

"That's no problem. I just wanted to make sure you're all right. Take your time - and call me Samuel!"

Five minutes later a still bleary-eyed Ben stumbled out of the office. "Have you got, uh, a bathroom?"

"Of course." Hyland was smiling. "It's right down at the end of the hall there." He pointed. "And then I can fix you some breakfast."

"I've decided I won't be able to stay, Mr. - Samuel. I really woulda liked to." That was the truth. "But I got...responsibilities."

The older man's face fell, but only slightly. "I'm disappointed, but I can't say as I'm surprised. Don't worry - after you've cleaned yourself up, that offer of breakfast still stands."

Ben glanced down the hall, then back at the room he was leaving. "Can you watch my stuff?"

"I'll be here. But better than that, you can lock the door from the outside and take the key with you."

So Ben took the key and his duffel bag, which contained shaving gear and a change of clothes. Not exactly _clean_ clothes, but at least he hadn't just slept in them.

He peered at himself in the bathroom mirror. _Ugh. The beard has to go._ But at this point, washing came first. He stripped off his shirt, with the usual struggle to get his bum left arm out of it. Then he glanced back at the mirror - and almost choked.

_I'm seein' a __**vision**__ in the mirror. A vision. That's all it is, all it can possibly be -_

But his desperately probing fingers proved it was no vision.

He'd slept all night in a room locked from the _in_side. And he'd wakened in the same position in which he'd gone to sleep: fully dressed, shirt buttoned up to his collar, with the precious Gospel - stained and moldy and smelly though it was - serving as a pillow. No one could have gotten to him, no one could have done anything to him.

But his chest was now festooned with a tattoo. A very real tattoo - of a tree as large as Justin's, but covered with iridescent leaves!

His bumbling fingers managed to get his shaving mirror out of his duffel bag without breaking it, and he used it in tandem with the wall mirror to get a look at his back.

By the time he'd positioned the mirror, he thought he was prepared for what he'd see. But the rainbow-hued glow of _four_ more shimmering trees, reflected back by the wall mirror, took his breath away.

Resisting the urge to drop to his knees - which would have broken the connection between mirrors - he simply stood there for an hour, lost in awestruck prayer.

If any unfortunate needed to use the locked bathroom, he failed to hear.

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The End

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_**Author's Afterword:**_ The Gnostic Gospel of Thomas is of course real, as are the quotations taken from it. It's the one Gnostic work Carnivale creator Daniel Knauf acknowledges having read. But barring secret transmission by an order such as the Templars, it would not have been available to anyone in the 1930s.

A further note: Fans eventually learned Mr. Knauf's plan _didn't_ involve Ben's fathering twins, or having a predestined role to play after 1945.


End file.
